AT around 9:28 a.m., a passenger plane with 150 people on board crashed near the Sugar King area in Middle Road.
An emergency response team rushed to the scene of the site and to the emergency operations center to control the situation—the worst disaster to hit Saipan since World War II.
As of 10 a.m., there were 50 reported casualties on the burning plane, and seven casualties on the ground, while 12 people were still missing on the ground.
Plane fuel spilled onto the lagoon, and the Emergency Management Office confirmed an approaching typhoon.
This was the scenario created for the final part of the three-day Emergency Management Techniques training held yesterday at the EMO building on Capitol Hill.
Les Omans, an emergency expert hired by the University of California Davis to conduct training on emergency management in the Northern Marianas, said the “mock” plane crash accident put to test the alertness and skills of CNMI emergency response personnel and agencies.
“There are three things here. One, we teach them emergency management techniques. Two, we help them become better emergency managers. And lastly, we give them problem-solving activities—how they are supposed to resolve issues,” Omans told Variety while overseeing the flow of the mock emergency situation.
